Legion World Forums LEGION CLUBHOUSE The Legion of Super-Heroes Long Live the Legion! Some Suite Talk for Mr. Frances Manapul

I love the glimpses of the Legionnaires' apartments (with living rooms, you can hardly call them dorm rooms anymore...).

Are the details written into the script, or are they touches you've coming up with on your own?

Either way, they've been very entertaining- supplying much-needed characterization into the book.

It would've been nice to see a holo of Colossal Boy's brother (maybe with a name scrawled across it or something-- we need to know what to call him instead of Big Gay Al) or other family memento sort of stuff in any of their rooms.

I hope there's more coming up! I'm looking forward to seeing Cham's room. And Shady's.

Which one was the most fun to play interior designer for?

Are the windows actually windows or some sort of holo-effect?

So far, I've liked Gim's and Jan's the best. These two have been the most character-revelatory.

Anyway, I wanted you to know that your hard work in this area has been much appreciated, at least by me. I've made much of them in CALLING THE ROLL.

1000 years, 2000 years,...

I just don't think teenaged boys will get anymore imaginative.

Let's see what's under those mattresses!

If Francis felt like saving himself some work, he could legitimately use a totally black panel to represent Shady's room...

This proves my long-believed theory that LSH fans would have enjoyed an all-Shirley issue, with each page showing her cleaning a different members' room. LOTS of stuff could have been learned about each character.

Yeah. I even liked the Giffen story from the last 'boot where Conner Superboy and Chuck Tane (I think) were doing scut work in the bowels of the Legion H.Q. Remember when they heard Cos and Q.K. going at it? You discover the neatest things working around the clubhouse!

Uh, huh... ignoring minor art inconsistencies that are a staple of commercial comic franchises... I commend Francis Manapul for knowing how to draw teenagers LIKE teenagers! There certainly is a new age of strokes in comics, one that, I admit, isolates itself from the old times of Neal, Grell, Giffen, or Pérez. Very manga-influenced, one that can be appreciated by a lot more. Congrats to Manapul for pulling that off.

This issue had a nice Cribs niché, but I'm dying for the Lo3W tie-in. The summer's not ending fast enough, ahahah...

I'd support an "at home issue," one in which no major battles happened, but we got better glimpses of everybody's personal lives. There've been a lot of nice issues like that. I remember when Karate Kid spent a lot of pages on why Phantom Girl wouldn't be his. It was really a nice insight to both their characters - visually and emotionally.

Heh, that was something Waid touched upon in the early issues. And various issues in Stern/McCraw's Legionnaires.

Back to the art... just one extra note to commend Francis' excellent use of hysterics - one that is prevalent in Legion comics. In the Muppet-style genre of human anatomy, he pulled their expressions off much better than Moy or Sprouse could ever do.

And let's see some consistency with the art in the upcoming issues. How did Ultra Boy get a Legion belt an issue before those "Carmine's" uniforms arrived?

Yeah, that was a DnA hommage to Keith Giffen, in my opinion. The writing was very close to the stye of JLE, with Sue Digby (before Meltzer) handling the Embassy.

Thanks for the compliments. Jim did write into the scripts the specifics of their bedrooms. Jims scripts are very very detailed and he throws in a lot of background stuff he asks me to put in many of which helps expand the story.

Are there any other subtle visual details Shooter put in the scripts to the issues that have already seen print, or even a few you may have added yourself, that you'd care to share with us, Francis? (whether room-related or otherwise)

Btw Francis, are you still going to be in Vancouver on August? I'd love to meet up by the VAG.